Star-Ledger file photoA judge found that Julian P. Heicklen was protected under the first amendment when he distributed pamphlets outside a New York courthouse advocating for jury nullification.

NEW YORK — A federal judge has dismissed jury tampering charges against a Bergen County man, saying that the pamphlets he distributed advocating jury nullification were protected speech, according to The New York Times.

Julian P. Heicklen, a retired Pennsylvania State University chemistry professor who lives in Teaneck, had been indicted on the charges earlier this year. Prosecutors alleged that he was tampering the jury pools by setting up a table outside federal courthouses and distributing the pamphlets, which were titled "Your Jury Rights: True or False."

They encouraged jurors not to convict people of crimes if they did not agree with the law, regardless of whether or not they thought the defendant was guilty. This process, known as jury nullification, is controversial among legal experts.

But because Heicklen was distributing the pamphlets to the general public outside the courthouse, hoping that jurors were among his audience but not targeting them specifically, the court ruled in his favor.

U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood, in comments quoted by the Associated Press, wrote that the ruling "merely maintains the existing balance that federal courts have found between freedom of speech and the administration of justice."